Papon's no to local coach
Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) president Nazmul Hassan Papon yesterday snubbed those who are advocating for a local head coach as an immediate replacement of Tigers' outgoing Australian coach Shane Jungensen.
“At this point of time, I am giving the preference to a foreign coach. And in the future hopefully we will have a local coach attached to a foreign coach, this is what we hope,” Papon said while responding to an obvious question; who will take the charge of the national team in the coming home series against India in June?
The BCB president made these remarks after coming out of the board meeting where a decision has been made to release Jurgensen with immediate effect, ending a week-long speculation on whether yesterday's meeting between Papon and Jurgenson would lead to a change of heart.
Papon also made it clear that they will try their best to appoint a foreign coach and only go for a local choice if the five-member committee -- Mahbubul Anam, Jalal Yunus, Akram Khan, Naimur Rahman and Khaled Mahmud -- fail to lure someone from abroad.
“Obviously we have a fascination with the local coach, but after talking to many people I have understood that taking a responsibility of a team that will play the World Cup in nine months, taking such a big responsibility, at this point of time is not readymade,” said the BCB boss.
Papon told the reporters that they have already communicated with some foreign coaches, who showed their interests to take over the helm of the Tigers.
“We believe that we will get a coach. But the problem is no coach is free, for a coach to leave a position that will take a long time. But we talked to one or two coaches and they have showed interest. We have talked to around 5-6 people, for development, national, and specialist coaches. We are talking to many coaches,” he said without disclosing the name of any prospective candidate.
BCB cricket operations committee chairman Akram, who is the direct boss of the Tigers and its support stuff, added: “Our highest priority is to find a foreign coach before the India series and we are hopeful. I think after five-six days it will be clear whether we need to appoint a local coach. We have tour of the A team and we will have to start the camp for the national team and for this we will employ some local coaches,” said Akram.
Like the BCB president, the former national captain was tight-lipped about disclosing the names of any probable candidate considering the previous bitter experience.
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